5-Hydroxytryptophan artificial synaptic vesicles across the blood-brain barrier for the rapid-acting treatment of depressive disorder.

Conventional antidepressants are slow to work and have serious side effects and poor response rates. As a precursor to 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT), 5-hydroxytryptophan (5-HTP) can be safely increased in concentration and rapidly metabolized into 5-HT in the brain, but the effectiveness of 5-HTP is severely limited due to its short half-life and lack of targeting. To traverse the blood-brain barrier (BBB) and achieve effective targeting, we designed a near-infrared (NIR) light-responsive artificial synaptic vesicles functionalized with an aptamer and loaded with 5-HTP and IR780.

High-temperature PTT/CDT coordination nanoplatform realizing exacerbated hypoxia for enhancing hypoxia-activated chemotherapy to overcome tumor drug resistance.

Background: Hypoxia-activated prodrugs present new opportunities for safe and effective tumor drug resistance therapy due to their high selectivity for hypoxic cells. However, the uneven distribution of oxygen in solid tumor and insufficient hypoxia in the tumor microenvironment greatly limit its therapeutic efficacy.

Results: In this paper, a novel AQ4N-Mn(II)@PDA coordination nanoplatform was designed and functionalized with GMBP1 to target drug-resistant tumor cells.

Folic acid-mediated hollow nanocomposites for in vivo MRI/FLI monitoring the metastasis of gastric cancer.

Background: Metastasis is one of the main factors leading to the high mortality rate of gastric cancer. The current monitoring methods are not able to accurately monitor gastric cancer metastasis.

Methods: In this paper, we constructed a new type of hollow nanocomposites, @HMSN-Cy7.

Folic Acid Functionalized AQ4N/Gd@PDA Nanoplatform with Real-Time Monitoring of Hypoxia Relief and Enhanced Synergistic Chemo/Photothermal Therapy in Glioma.

Purpose: Hypoxia is often associated with glioma chemoresistance, and alleviating hypoxia is also crucial for improving treatment efficacy. However, although there are already some methods that can improve efficacy by alleviating hypoxia, real-time monitoring that can truly achieve hypoxia relief and efficacy feedback still needs to be explored.

Methods: AQ4N/Gd@PDA-FA nanoparticles (AGPF NPs) were synthesized using a one-pot method and were characterized.

Biomimetic noncationic lipid nanoparticles for mRNA delivery.

Although the tremendous progress has been made for mRNA delivery based on classical cationic carriers, the excess cationic charge density of lipids was necessary to compress mRNA through electrostatic interaction, and with it comes inevitably adverse events including the highly inflammatory and cytotoxic effects. How to develop the disruptive technologies to overcome cationic nature of lipids remains a major challenge for safe and efficient mRNA delivery. Here, we prepared noncationic thiourea lipids nanoparticles (NC-TNP) to compress mRNA by strong hydrogen bonds interaction between thiourea groups of NC-TNP and the phosphate groups of mRNA, abandoning the hidebound and traditional electrostatic force to construct mRNA-cationic lipids formulation.

In vivo synergistic tumor therapies based on copper sulfide photothermal therapeutic nanoplatforms.

Tumor cells may be eliminated by increasing their temperature. This is achieved via photothermal therapy (PTT) by penetrating the tumor tissue with near-infrared light and converting light energy into heat using photothermal agents. Copper sulfide nanoparticles (CuS NPs) are commonly used as PTAs in PTT.

Cobalt Ferrite-Gossypol Coordination Nanoagents with High Photothermal Conversion Efficiency Sensitizing Chemotherapy against Bcl-2 to Induce Tumor Apoptosis.

Gossypol is a chemotherapeutic drug that can inhibit the anti-apoptotic protein Bcl-2, but the existing gossypol-related nanocarriers cannot well solve the problem of chemotherapy resistance. Based on the observation that gossypol becomes black upon Fe coordination, it is hypothesized that encasing gossypol in glyceryl monooleate (GMO) and making it coordinate cobalt ferrite will not only improve its photothermal conversion efficiency (PCE) but also help it enter tumor cells. As the drug loading content and drug encapsulation efficiency of gossypol are 10.

X-ray-Guided In Situ Genetic Engineering of Macrophages for Sustained Cancer Immunotherapy.

Effective repolarization of macrophages has emerged as a promising approach for anticancer therapy. However, there are very few studies on the effect of reprogramming macrophages from M2 phenotype to M1 phenotype without reconversion while maintaining an activated M1 phenotype. Moreover, these immunomodulatory methods have serious drawbacks due to the activation of normal monocytic cells.

Biomedical Photoacoustic Imaging for Molecular Detection and Disease Diagnosis: "Always-On" and "Turn-On" Probes.

Photoacoustic (PA) imaging is a nonionizing, noninvasive imaging technique that combines optical and ultrasonic imaging modalities to provide images with excellent contrast, spatial resolution, and penetration depth. Exogenous PA contrast agents are created to increase the sensitivity and specificity of PA imaging and to offer diagnostic information for illnesses. The existing PA contrast agents are categorized into two groups in this review: "always-on" and "turn-on," based on their ability to be triggered by target molecules.